The Oath and the Gem
by Decantate
Summary: A collection of scenes that expand on the Blood Poison story. Zevran/Surana overall, with Alistair/Sigrun YES, Zevran/Anders, and possibly other pairings. Most of these will be short, quick reads.
1. Good Dog

It burned beneath his fur and he kept snapping at his flank even though he was smart enough to know that there was nothing there to bite anymore when a smell made his head lift.

There she was. She smelled like old stone and rainstorms and he felt relief, for he had been waiting for the smell of his new mistress. And then she glanced at him and he cringed at the way her smell changed, the way she held herself, because she stood there like _bad dog, afraid, do not want_ and went away. It did not make any sense because master-who-he-loved said he was a _good dog_, said so over and over, and he would not hurt her if she was his mistress.

He laid his head down and didn't even bother snapping at the burning again. New mistress did not want him. Maybe master had not gotten up because he was a bad dog.

* * *

He lifted his head again when her smell came back and she was twisted away from him, did not even see how he wagged his tail a little to show that he _was_ a good dog. White plants fell out of her clothes and she hurried away from him, following after the man who smelled like old matings. He almost bit the kennel-master when he put the medicine on his back because it hurt and it hurt more because he loved her and she did not want him.

* * *

When the black things came he tore them apart and ran. The burning stopped and he caught a rabbit and slept in a sunny spot and then ran again. The smell of old stone and rainstorms came to him and he stopped, whimpering, but _bad dog, do not want_, he remembered, so he ran again away from the smell of his mistress, slow with doubt.

* * *

Sun and moon and sun and moon came and he stopped running in a stable. Children came and he felt inclined to be nice to them because they were _covered_ in want and they said _good dog, good dog_ over and over. The mother came and she smelled like tiredness and milk and sad, so he licked her and told her how he was a nice dog. They did not smell as good as the rainstorm mistress or the master-who-he-loved but they had more want than anything he had ever smelled so he stayed with them. It felt nice after the _do not want_ which still stung him. When the dark things came he protected the house and tore them apart and they loved him and told him that he was such a good dog. He wagged his tail with his whole body and finally believed them from end to end because it was true. He was a _good dog!_


	2. Float

Zevran shook the dust from his hands as he walked in, watching in silence as Neria slowly stood from the chair and took a few awkward steps forward. He came up behind her and pressed his thumbs on either side of her spine.

"Ah, my dear Warden, I wish that the child did not pain you so."

"It does not," she lied. He ducked down to press a smile into the back of her neck.

"You work me so hard every minute of the day," he complained, and she gave a snorting laugh. "Let me have a little time to relax this afternoon, my luscious goddess. Come and take a walk with me."

* * *

They went to a wide, deserted beach. He coaxed her out of her clothes and across the sand. The waves were lapping at her thighs when she stopped and would go no further. Eventually she made her confession, leaning away as he tugged her hands: "Zev. I can't swim."

He laughed at her and she glared at him and he laughed harder. "How is it that I have known you so many years now and did not know this? How did you get to this age without knowing how to swim?"

The glower was the only response she would give and if he were grinning any wider his cheeks would surely split open. "Oh, is this a _Tower_ issue?" He gave her hands another tug.

She worked to remove her hands from his grasp and he was just as nimble in catching her fingers again. They struggled like this for a moment when she gave a burst of laughter. "_Yes_, it is a Tower issue, you horrible man! I can't tell you all of my flaws. It would be an extremely short and boring conversation."

He laughed again and came closer, coaxing her into deeper water with his arm around her back. "Indulge me, _mi amora._ Do you think that I would let anything happen to you? No. I will wait until you have given me my child at least before I toss you away, you should know this."

"I hate you."

"Oh? Is this why you keep me up all night with your carnal demands?"

"I hate all of you except your tongue."

"And my _pisello_."

"And your _pisello_."

"And my fingers."

She didn't respond to this, trying to skitter back a little when a larger wave slapped against her hips. He held her firmly up and she clung to his arm. He gave in to temptation and brushed his cheek and lips adoringly over her shoulder.

"And my tattoos," he said when he lifted his head. "You don't make a very big fuss over them, but I can see by your greedy eyes how obscenely handsome you think I am."

"I would not go so far as… ooh!" she gasped. She was finally deep enough in that the water buoyed her up, his arms secure around her. The child's weight floated in the ocean instead of hanging from her spine, and he could feel the release of tension from her back.

"There you go," he murmured against her ear, endlessly smug. "Perhaps you do not hate me so very much, mmm?"

"Oh no, Zev. You are the cleverest man I have ever met and obscenely handsome as well," she answered happily, her fingers clenching his wrist white-knuckled. "Truly a prince among elves."

He laughed throatily, nipped her ear, then laughed again at how she jumped a little in his arms. Knowing his luck, he would be forced to satisfy her carnal demands yet _again_ today, too.


	3. Jealousy

_AN: aaaaand... the rating just went up. Cough._

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* * *

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Anders turned from the door, frowning, and his eyes lit on the elf sitting in his chair.

"Good afternoon," said the elf—the well-armed elf, come to think—with a smooth foreign accent.

"Yes, I'd _thought_ I'd locked the door," responded Anders. "Who the bloody hell are you?"

The intruder tsked and stood to bow. "Zevran Arainai. Zev, to my friends. I am very pleased to make your acquaintance, good Warden. You are Anders, are you not?"

"Yes." Anders eyed Zevran warily, wondered if he knew… yes, of course he knew. He blew out a sigh. "So she did make it over there, then?"

"This is the question of the day, I am learning." Zevran walked over the floor, each step rolling into the other so that there was no sound, but did not directly approach Anders. "And since I have curiosities of my own, I will tell you this: yes, she made it to me, our formidable lady, but of her fate after this I cannot say."

"Well that's… unsettling," Anders crossed his arms, trying to work out what it was about Zevran that Neria had so plainly fancied more than him. "And curiosities of your own? I'm all a-quiver."

Zevran gave a sharp little smile. "Allow me to explain. Our friend, she is a woman most deliciously inclined to many varied sensual pleasures. Prostitutes, lovemaking in the open, bindings... once, and I think you might like to know this, I helped her to seduce a templar as a gift for her upon some occasion."

Anders's brows could not have shot higher at this point. "_Really?_"

"Oh yes." Zevran managed to make those two little words roll off his tongue like honey and his circuit of the room was coming closer to Anders. "So considering this and how at the time we had never yet expected any sort of… fidelity in our sexual lives, you can imagine my great surprise and secret pleasure upon discovering that she had been almost completely celibate while I was apart from her. With only one exception, I am given to understand, and I find myself wanting to know what she knew, to learn what qualities you possess that drew her out."

Zevran was quite near now and he reached up to draw the backs of his fingers drew Anders's stubble. Anders was pulling away when Zevran's hand turned and his thumb barely touched the mage's lower lip. A rough callous snagged on his mouth and Anders stopped with an unexpected internal jolt.

"Ah, sorry! You appear to have the wrong, er, idea," Anders said, tense as the fingers went down his throat. Andraste's knickers, elves are always so beautiful and it had never occurred to him to think of the _men_ as such but here this tattooed specimen was demonstrating otherwise. "I don't really go in for men, you understand."

"Really? Oh, this is a crime, dear Warden. Such a magnificently compelling man limiting himself so? I can hardly bear to think of all of the hearts you must have broken with this policy. But consider something." Anders felt all hot and cold at once and kept still as now Zevran ran his thumb over his upper lip. "I am only going to be in your Keep for two more hours and then will be leaving Ferelden for good. Perhaps also you should consider that I grew up in an Antivan whorehouse and have been told that I posses some formidable skill. Should you ever desire to try such a thing, you will not come across a better opportunity."

Anders stared down at the elf, struggling to gather together the right words to make a sentence, when Zevran's hand slid to cup the back of his neck and urge him forward. _Oh, hell,_ Anders thought, bowing his head to the other man's, and Zevran's kiss was like a revelation, the coaxing slide of lips, the faint touch of teeth, and even the masterful use of hot breath to tease Anders's skin. The mage shut his eyes and found that thought fled easily. He reached behind him; the bolt of the door slid home.

* * *

"You know, she never would speak of you."

"Would she not?" Anders glanced over at Zevran, startled by the blatant affection in his voice. The elf was stretching his back, as well he might, as Anders was previously unaware that people could flex in the ways that Zevran had been doing a few minutes ago. "Somehow I do not find myself surprised at this."

"Now don't leave me all hanging. What answers did you learn by doing this?" Anders gestured to himself, cooling and still painted with Zevran's seed. Speaking of which… Anders rolled out of the bed and made for the washbasin.

Zevran laughed for a little while, slipping out of the bed himself and reaching for his clothes. "I think that it was like when I go to a whorehouse for a good prostitute, all perfumed and musky." Anders's brows shot up. "To me, this is good comfortable sex, like home. And to her, sex with a mage, a mage she knew before she became the great Hero and Arlessa and whatever else your people named her… it was a trying time for her, I suppose, yes?" Zevran stopped speaking briefly as he tugged his undershirt over his head. "So she went to you."

"I was like her little dolly then. How enchanting." Anders peered around the room and tried to figure out where the hell his robes had got to. "I carried quite the flame for her back in the day. The way that woman could shoot a templar…"

It wasn't until Anders caught sight of Zevran's cold look that he realized his voice had gone all dreamy. He raised his hands, which ought to be a _more_ threatening gesture from a mage, but wasn't just now. "Back in the day I said! Turn off the evil death eyes! I kept waiting for her to stop pining after Zevran the Magnificent here," Zevran laughed and paused in fastening his armor to bow, "but it never happened. Come to think of it, I did hear her say one thing about you." Ah! There were his robes. Anders pulled them out of the blankets and shook them out.

"Yes? You cannot leave me in suspense. What was said?"

"She, ah," Anders slid his robes over his head. "It was right after we stopped a plot to assassinate her. She said that she loved you. And then she would never say another word on the subject."

* * *

Neria leaned her back against Zevran's chest while in the bed nursing Shartan. Zevran stroked his fingers down the softness of her breast and from there across his son's silky cheek, then lifted his hand to do it again. "I slept with the mage Anders while I was fetching Alistair." He nestled his cheek in the crook of her bare shoulder.

"Did you?" Neria gave a wicked little giggle. "And now I'm all proud. Weren't you in the Vigil for just a little while? My clever Zev! And lucky, too! A healer mage! Now you won't be impressed with my little fire and lightning tricks anymore."

Zevran laughed and kissed her shoulder. "I think I am developing a mage fetish, to tell you the truth. Every one of you is filled with the most delightful surprises in the bedroom. And to be perfectly honest, it was nice to be with a man again."

"If you wish to find another man to sleep with here, I would not stop you," she said, her grin still plain in her voice.

"I know," said Zevran lightly. He ran his cheek over the softness of her shoulder and the base of her neck, his hand gentle as he cupped the side of her face. His heart burned for his beloved again; they both knew he would not take another lover, but neither of them spoke of it.


	4. Chaste

The door opened and Neria looked up. "Oh, Zevran, good." She wrenched the tie on the pack tighter and stood from her crouch, a purse in hand. "Take this money and see if the dwarves have better weapons or armor for you. Purchase what you deem to be best and use the remainder as you need for your poisons." She moved closer to give the coin to him. "I am taking Alistair and meeting with King Bhelen in a few minutes. We'll be leaving straight after."

He took a step and bowed his head to kiss her. Her eyes dropped shut. Their lips ghosted together and the secret ache coiled beneath her breastbone. Her lips touched the tiny hollow at the corner of his mouth. "I don't have time—"

"I know," he murmured, but one hand came up to curve over her hair, barely touching it. She moved her lips to the swell of his cheek, the treasured skin. Her hand rested on his chest and her breathing ached at the feel of his strength and his grace and the beating of his fine brave heart. His breath touched her shoulder and she allowed a slim line of her own breath to trace over his jaw. She felt a fine tremor pass through his body, quickly suppressed.

She moved back to his mouth, his perfect clever mouth, and their lips joined in a gentle movement that did not even involve teeth or tongue. They parted. Her eyes opened; she saw that his did not, saw how his mouth was opened over smooth, controlled breathing. He took the purse and slipped away, leaving without looking at her again. She felt relief that he was gone because she hated that she loved him but her love for him was like a burning that crawled beneath her flesh, far hotter than any darkspawn taint.


	5. Cullen

Neria didn't ignore Templars any more than one ignored rugs or chamber pots. They were just part of the furniture in a room, but this one was becoming something more than a bookshelf by not wearing his bucket helm and by looking at her. She felt his gaze on her shoulder, on her hair and she liked the touch of it, so she looked up, even though she hated Templars on principle.

Their eyes met for a fraction of a second before his snapped away to stare vacantly across the middle of the room. "What's your name?" she asked.

"I-I'm Cullen."

"Oh." She went back to her book and read for a page and a half when the awareness came upon her that more of a response might be required, mainly because this Templar was standing there looking human instead of looking like a pillar. She looked up again and just caught him looking away.

"I'm Neria Surana." He nodded and she found herself studying his face, liking what she saw, her palms itching for the feel of his curls. She put the book away and left quickly.

* * *

He often forgot his helm but even when he wore it she came to know which one was him. She would pass a few inches too close to him, looking up at him from beneath her lashes and wondering if he allowed his longing to show on his face when it was hidden behind metal. She chose the spots for her studies with care—never too obviously close to him, but always within his eyesight.

Once she pulled a book from a middle of the stack and they all started toppling. She leapt up to try to brace it but Cullen was there, his hands above hers, sliding them back in. His armor bumped into her back and, while she knew how to blush on purpose to fluster men, she felt a flush coming over her skin without being bidden this time.

* * *

For months Cullen tormented Neria's thoughts at night. She would turn in her blankets, his shoulders spreading broad beneath her hands, his mouth on her throat and his eyes dark with wanting. In the daytime she began to cautiously seduce him. This chiefly involved initiating occasional conversations with him, sitting gradually closer to where he watched, and every few days, trying to catch his glimpse directly. It would take years at this rate but she wasn't going anywhere.

Neria went to her Harrowing and held Cullen's eyes for the space of several heartbeats, studying his agonized expression. She knew that she would succeed and yet was comforted by the thought that the man who might kill her would regret her death. She smiled for him and when he later stammered out an offer of friendship, she felt a thrill. She had never yet had a lover who was also a friend, but she thought that she might like it, despite her aversion to sentiment.

* * *

Neria went straight to the Circle Tower from Ostagar, young and new to the Wardens and still gasping at the rush of sensation that came with every rainfall. She knelt before Cullen's cage after all of her powers had failed to break it, leaned her head against it, spread her hands over the blue wall. She watched his face numbly as he called for the deaths of all mages in the Tower and her palms ached for the feel of his red curls. She saw how his eyes were tortured, saw those who had fallen around him, and felt the books on blood magic heavy in her own pack. She had seen enough of Sten's fighting to picture the swing of Cullen's sword when he would come to cut her down.

* * *

"Why?" The week after Neria bedded Zevran for the first time Alistair asked this, his heartbreak cracking his voice, and to the end of her days she never gave him the true answer: _Cullen taught me to fear even you._


	6. Sleep

This occurs around the same time as chapter 12 of Blood Poison.

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* * *

She didn't set up her tent tonight. Zevran tied a rope from his tent to a peg, water smacking the back of his head through the trees. He stood in time to watch her crawl into the tent that Leliana and Wynne were sharing instead.

Sten shared first watch with him, which made it easy to pass the hours on dark wooded paths without talking. Sten woke Neria and Leliana for second watch and Zevran went into his own tent before they emerged. He forced himself to sleep quickly to smother the tight feeling that was coiled in his chest.

He awoke from a deep sleep to movement nearby and did not open his eyes. The sounds: buckles clicking, cloth sliding. Neria fit herself into his bedroll, nudging under his arm, her skin cool and her hair damp from the rain. Her arm went about his chest and her head against his neck.

"You do not like to sleep with me." He allowed himself to mutter this resentfully, not turning fully toward her, not opening his eyes.

She didn't answer, but instead she smoothed a kiss over his collarbone, took his head in her hands, coaxed his face to turn toward her. She kissed his forehead, ran her lips over his brows, his eyelids. Her fingers stroked the back of his neck and he could feel her start to tremble.

He turned and wound his arm and leg over her to press her tightly against him. When their lips met he refused to gasp, refused to open his eyes to see what might be in hers. When their kiss broke he rested his chin against her hair, rested her head against his shoulder, and tugged his blanket better over her back. Her fingers were making small lines down his back when sleep found him again.


	7. Power

_AN: (Yes author's notes suck.) So! This was written as an expansion of chapter 11 of Blood Poison but I didn't post it here back then because I was too shy. But I guess I know you guys and you seem all right so I'll share it here, too. It has the hallmarks of my earlier writing but I'll leave it as-is for historical accuracy. Man, my earlier writing days back in May, I barely remember what we were like then, am I rite?_

_Warning for mild BSDM. Also, you're welcome for BSDM._

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* * *

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Blood flew past Zevran's ear to the ogre and the great beast turned around, charging into the row of darkspawn archers to the left. The archers to the right all fell to the ground at once, writhing in pain. He started toward them, but quickly halted when the lightning started to fork. He watched as the ogre fell, not even struggling against Oghren's axe.

Neria, who had slain the entire mass save the ogre without touching one, stood quietly and alone. Her body was made of light, as if she were crafted of lantern glass. As he watched, even her blood did not turn red until it dripped from her fingers.

* * *

Neria, the stench of death still upon her, lifted the crown and told the lie that would give the dwarves a strong king. Motes of magic fell from her skin in shining wisps of green and whispers trailed behind her when she walked away.

* * *

He opened his door that night to find Neria on the other side of it, hair nearly dry from a bath, standing barefoot in mage's robes. He could not easily recall the last time he had seen her awake without magic stroking visibly on her skin. He waved her in and closed the door behind her.

"What have you come here for, hmm?" He brushed her cheek with the backs of his fingers and her eyes closed. He traced her throat with the lightest of touches and her breathing hitched. He felt her hands upon his legs and slipped away from her touch, around her.

He wrapped an arm around her waist and tipped her over just a little, grinding against her bottom. He bit the nape of her neck, then sunk his teeth harder, hard enough for pain, and heard that little double-stop in her breathing that was for this woman as good as crying out his name.

"So eager tonight and so quiet." He licked the skin at the base of her neck and released her. "Take off your clothes and get into bed."

She was crouched on the bed when he came to her with the ropes. He saw the sudden fear in her eyes and one part of him was glad that she was not so foolish as to forget that he was an assassin, but another confusing part of him was wounded by it. It was this second part that drove him to smother her protest with a hard kiss, to gather her wrists together and push her back. To grip her hands above her head without reassuring her.

When he started winding rope around her wrists she began to pull away, so he relented (a quick flash in his mind of burned creatures that had died because she had willed it so). "You will like this," he said, and he heard the rough panting in his voice, his control slipping with his confusion. "To be touched without being able to touch."

He allowed the edges of his leather armor to scrape over her bare skin as he crawled to her feet. He slid his hands along the insides of her legs to spread them before binding her ankles to the frame of the bed. This done, he immediately slid back to bury his mouth between her legs.

He worked quickly, spread her open with his tongue before he laved the swelling bud hidden there. He suckled to keep contact as her body arched; her breathing stopping entirely. He felt her tremble and immediately released her to bite the muscle of her thigh hard. She thrashed, carefully silent even now. She would make an excellent assassin, but only in bed.

He knelt up and reached for her nipple while undoing the buckles on his armor with the other hand. He watched her dark eyes as her breathing came quick. "I want to hear your voice, my Warden," he said, voice gone even rougher. He pulled the leathers over his head and bent to take her whole breast in his mouth while he pinched and twisted the nipple of the other. She arched again, her breathing halted. "Where is your voice?" He moved to kiss the abused nipple while his hand stroked down and slipped into her wetness. Ropes creaked as she struggled to rub herself against his hand.

He pulled his hand away and lifted his head and was rewarded by a small sound, little more than a sigh with a tiny hum behind it. He glanced up at her face. "What was that?" He stroked his wet thumb down that bundle of nerves between her folds and lifted his hand again.

She whimpered this time and before the sound was fully out of her throat his fingers were within her, his thumb moving back and forth quickly. The sound grew to a mewling and the moment she climaxed he was between her legs and thrusting hard into her body, ropes protesting at her ankles and her muscles clenching strongly around him again and again.

Just as her eyes opened he was lifting a dagger from the floor, enchanted with steaming frost. Her eyes went wide. He smiled and straightened above her, still buried within her heat. He rocked his hips; she swayed against the ropes. "Do you fear me, my beauty?" he purred while laying the cold flat of the blade against her naked thigh.

With the quick grace that he used in battle, he leaned back and slashed through the bindings holding her ankles. Ropes still trailing her feet, he folded her legs up and pounded hard into her. She screamed when she came again and the sound of it was joined to his rough cry as he found his pleasure.

He dropped his head to her soft breast and turned his ear to rest against her pounding heart. Her legs grew loose around his waist. The urge to be gentle overcame him so he turned his head again to kiss between her breasts and reached down to stroke where he had bitten her leg. "Did you like that, my friend?" he asked in a kind voice.

"Yes," she said, breathless. "Yes." He moved up to kiss her then, still buried in her warmth. He untied her wrists blindly and they continued kissing, both of them trembling a little, both cupping the other's face in their hands.


	8. Morning

Part of chapter 40 of Blood Poison.

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* * *

Alistair woke to the sunlight still thin and cool.

There was Sigrun, her tattoos distorted by her cheek pressed to the mattress. Her black hair creeped in short spikes against the linens. He shifted his hand beneath the sheets and eased it into the dip of her waist, the sharp curve that she had. His littlest finger rose up to the mound of her hip.

"Mm," she said, half-asleep. He tucked himself closer to her and touched his lips to her wild hair. "Mm, sleeping."

"I know." He drew the blanket higher over her shoulder. "Love you."

"Love you too." Her short fingers touched his wrist and he drifted fell back to sleep.

* * *

Alistair woke to the shifting of his own hips, the sound of his own moan.

"Heeeey there big guy," said Sigrun in a low voice, teasing. "I'd say it's time to be up but you've been up for some time now." Both of her hands were wrapped around him.

"Now that's not fai—ah!" His back arched as she squeezed him tighter.

"What's not—" she dissolved into giggles. Alistair rolled her up on top of him and groaned again as she tugged his length with the motion.

Her giggles were quieted after a time. Her strong body tensed against his stomach while he tasted and breathed into her sex. Her hands on him would move forgetfully as he slowly massaged her with his tongue. He gripped her round backside when her whole body bowed and she gasped his name.

* * *

Later she was collapsed over him, her gasps puffing against his neck as his heart raced and he twitched from that funny slippery feeling of sliding free from her body. His hands went over the curves of her back, her hair catching in his beard, her skin smelling of him.

"I love you."

"You say that so much!"

He smiled lazily, his eyes drifted shut. "Because I love you so much. Is that so wrong?"

"No." She kissed his shoulder and curled her arm around his head, her hand burying in his hair. "I love you too, big guy."


	9. Fort Drakon

Part of chapter 13 of Blood Poison.

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* * *

"Surrender, and you may be shown mercy."

Neria's eyes flicked up and down the line of archers. Two mages; she could kill them easily enough, but the archers—her gaze settled again on the dark-haired woman before her.

_Hold your tongue, churl._ She remembered this woman at Loghain's side, the curl of her lip matching Neria's own. _Your betters are talking._

"Death first!" Neria screamed, and Sten gave a mighty roar as she stepped into her fade shield.

* * *

"Zevran!"

He ducked beneath the swords of the man in front of him and drove one blade beneath leather straps. Blood slid over his hands. "Yes, my Warden!" He risked a quick glance. They had Neria's arms behind her back and had lifted her off the floor.

"Take them out!" He watched as she pushed against the men holding her and lashed out with her heel at the dark-haired woman who had ordered the surrender. The woman's head snapped back and Zevran felt a rush of something hot and unsettling in his belly. "Follow Zev!"

Zevran leapt away from the swing of a sword and made for the passageway where Morrigan waited. "Sten!" He watched the pommel of a sword descend on Neria's temple, watched her fall limp in their arms. "You heard what was said! Come!"

The qunari threw men off of him like rain from a shaking mabari and the three of them left the Warden behind.

* * *

The lash painted her back in a line of fire and the tail of it whipped around her waist to crack open the skin of her belly. Neria shrieked around the gag.

Her face was wet with tears and spittle and blood and as she writhed the veil tore to strips around her, her body swollen thick with mana but her hands were bound against casting. Demons watched her. She felt the stroke of their touch over her throat, her breasts, felt the blood running down her legs and the blood thrumming in the veins of her captors, their deaths held inside her bound hands. She stitched up and tore open the veil in cycles.

A man came to the front of her and leaned in close to say something and she could not make out his words out of the whispers of the rage demons even as she tried to muffle their voices. She arched, ripping open her wounds further, and kicked him hard between the legs. He fell and a gauntleted fist punched the back of her head; she knew no more.

* * *

Zevran moved his thumb over the gem in his palm, each breath expanding the sickening trembling in his belly. He felt his smile shredding at the edges. "Is this about how to best retrieve our Warden or is this about who beds her?" He fought to keep his voice smooth, struggled against the hissing and shouting that was clawing through his throat.

"Oh, of _course_ you manage to bring that into even this discussion!" Alistair's hands closed to fists, his gauntlets making tiny scraping noises around his knuckles.

"I only ask because I have done this sort of thing before and Morrigan is both a shape-shifter and a healer, which will become useful considering that our Warden could, at this moment we are arguing, be having her fingers sliced off." Zevran has seen Alistair work. He would need to avoid the hands and would slip behind him to slide his knife into the man's throat. He smiled up at the human wider, his own hands open and ready for his daggers. "Taking you in, this would be difficult, and would allow the foul creatures time to rape her, perhaps break her teeth."

Alistair was turning white. "_Maker_, Zev."

Zevran slipped past him and left, clenching his fists to stop the shaking that was running down his arms.

* * *

Neria woke. She was lying on stone and something else that pricked her back. Her body thrummed to the beating of her heart. She turned her head and panted as pain burst through her, racing down her spine to her heels. Head injuries, then.

She found that she could open one eye and that the other was crusted closed. The man in the cell beside her babbled at her, and once she heard the words 'Fort Drakon' she thrust the sounds of his voice from her head.

She staggered to her feet and gnawed at the ropes covering her hands like an animal. She had learned about Fort Drakon from Enchanter Talis when she was fourteen. She could kill every person in this room, yes, but she would need to address her wounds before she would confront the barking down the hall. She waited, wearing her teeth down on the fibers at her wrists.

* * *

Zevran twisted his dagger in the body of the last guard and kicked him away. His Warden was pressed up against the bars of her prison, bruises covering her face, blood from the cuts to her waist running down the front her lovely slim thighs and—

His hand slackened and he nearly dropped his blade. He put is weapons away and fumbled with his lockpicks, the metal sliding through the hole uselessly. In the bright light of the Brecilian forest they had awoken to her blood on the bedroll. They had washed it together and made love in the stream, the red swirling away, and that had been months ago and she had not bled since which meant—

"There was a key in the pocket of the Jailer, Zevran, if you are struggling," said Morrigan with a smirk beside him, dangling said key from a slim finger.

"Ah, my thanks." Zevran took it from her and another of Morrigan's healing spells was cast on Neria, her bruises slipping away from her skin.

The moment that he cut the ropes away from Neria's wrists her arms were flung around him and he bore her up, one hand digging into her backside, the other curled around her back and he pressed his lips to her healing mouth. Blood flaked away from her belly where it pressed against his armor, her belly that might be holding his child, his son or his daughter, and his chest burned with something that he could not name.

"Now, if you are quite finished with that nauseating display of lust in the middle of a prison filled with our enemies…?" Morrigan folded her arms.

Neria's arms tightened around him as her feet touched the ground again and she laughed, low. "I knew that you would be the ones to come, my dearest and cleverest friends."

"I do not know that I care to be grouped thusly with Zevran."

Zevran chuckled and put his mouth to Neria's ear. "Did you miss me?"

She laughed and kissed him, raking her fingers up through his hair in a way that made his neck prickle. "Of course you are both the cleverest. And I am going to buy new earrings for you, Morrigan. Ten new pairs of earrings. Your ears will chime like bells!"

"Foolishness," said the witch.

Something panged within Zevran when Neria pulled away to stride out of the cell like a conqueror. He shook himself and followed. He would give her his earring tonight.


	10. Seleny

He had been gone two weeks, two, and it was supposed to have been four days. She slept in their bed, the Antivan air sweltering even in darkness, her heart hardening around this life that they'd chosen in the center of the Crows. In her dreams she burned Antiva City down.

She slid out of the bed before her eyes opened, crouched beside a clothes-chest, her finger tracing sigils.

"Amora."

He limped to her. She straightened and wove her fingers through his hair, tightening fists in it.

"There was resistance. They knew that we were coming. I think that a fool is setting himself to be a Master in Seleny."

She touched her forehead against his, watching his grey-shadowed eyes, the tattoo curving just to one side of the heel of her hand. Her heart stung and she closed her eyes.

"I am afraid that we will need—"

"Why aren't you kissing me?"

And then he was, their mouths greedy and sucking. They fell against the bed, some tear on his trousers ragged against her thigh, his wound unhealed, the story of the last two weeks told in arched backs and rough hands, the words dead.


	11. First Kiss, Last Kiss

They collapsed against the stone and her head went against Alistair's shoulder, a small metallic sound from her earring as it struck his pauldron.

His head tipped over to look at her, his old sister-in-arms, and his eyes painted her clearly in the shadows—white streaks in her hair, her eyes glazed and half-shut. His belly always full now in _hunger_, a clawing that made him retch sometimes, his mind flashed to the ache of his youth, her flame-bright hair and a smile held like a knife in her teeth.

He pulled a gauntlet from his hand and turned her face up, his own black blood dirtying her pointed ear. Her eyes opened only a little more and then his mouth was on hers.

Grit on their skin, her tongue flickered out with a clean heat that seared him. He was twenty, he was the templar who loved a mage, he was not dying. He feasted on her, and in the small curves of her lips he found where he was still a human, not a ghoul and never a darkspawn.

He broke from her; she was looking at him with placid eyes. He pulled her up as he stood, and on they went in darkness that was not black anymore.

* * *

_This is my present to everyone for the holiday. Thanks to valiasedai for the quick beta, and I appreciate all of you who read these creaky old words of mine. You are wonderful!_


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